The Kingdom of God

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector

St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas

November 25, 2012; Last Pentecost, Proper 29, Year B

Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(John 18:33-37)  Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, "Are you the King of the Jews?" Jesus answered, "Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?" Pilate replied, "I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?" Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here." Pilate asked him, "So you are a king?" Jesus answered, "You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice." 

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“Are you the King of the Jews?” Pilate asks.  It’s a legal question.  He needs to know if Jesus is another Jewish insurrectionist challenging Rome.  “My kingdom is not of this world,” Jesus answers him.  I’m not going to challenge the Empire in the traditional way, through fighting, violence and warfare.  That’s not where my kingdom is.  My kingdom belongs to the truth.  Our reading doesn’t continue.  But Pilate responds abstractly, “What is truth?”  And he’s satisfied Jesus isn’t a threat.  So he has Jesus flogged, a form of Roman torture.  Later the accusers will convince Pilate that Jesus is a challenge to the Empire, and Pilate will pronounce a sentence of capital punishment upon him.

No big deal.  The Kingdom of the Empire just doing what it does to protect its power – using force and violence just to make sure nothing might compromise that power. 

Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Caesar?  We have a number of these opposites in scripture.  Kingdom of Heaven or of the World?  The Spirit or the Flesh?

Jesus’ Kingdom is indeed different.  It wasn’t political in the sense that Pilate was concerned with.  But it was subversive.  Jesus’ Kingdom was almost the opposite of the Kingdom of the Empire.  Yet his Kingdom has proved more enduring, more resilient, more true. 

More than anything else in the Gospels, Jesus talked about the Kingdom of God – the Rule of God.  His imagination was full of the Kingdom of God.  So, what is the Kingdom of God? 

The Lord’s Prayer gives us a clue.  “Thy will be done.  Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.”  The Kingdom of God is God’s will being done on earth as it is in heaven.  It is how life on earth would be if God reigned, instead of Caesar, instead of you and me, little Caesars that we pretend to be.

It is a Kingdom that does not exercise power through force, but through love and compassion.  It is a different way of being in the world. 

Maybe you can remember some of the images Jesus gave us about the Kingdom:

The Kingdom of God is like a sower who sows seed with reckless extravagance.  Some of the seed hits hardpan, some lands in thin soil, and some is choked by thorns.  But the seed that lands in fertile soil is fantastically abundant.  What seed his been thrown our way?

That same field has weeds and good seed growing together.  Leave them alone, says Jesus.  Don’t try to pull out the bad weeds, you might harm the good plants.  Let them grow together.  Eventually God can tell the difference. 

The Kingdom of God seems small, under the radar, almost invisible.  Look for it in the unexpected place, the humble place.  It is like a tiny mustard seed or a hidden treasure or a small shake of leaven in a huge pile of flour.  Despite its size, it will grow until it makes everything around it valuable.

The Kingdom of God is for all.  It welcomes tax collectors and harlots.  It rejoices at the return of the prodigal.  God’s kingdom searches for the lost sheep and the lost coin, and it yields to the persistent ones who keep knocking, seeking and asking for what they need.  It is a wedding feast that compels everyone to enter.  And it is the happy reward for the good servants who have done what was their duty.

The Kingdom of God is simple, but not easy.  It can be missed.  It is a narrow gate.  The rich fool who spends his life filling his barns with surplus can miss it.  The rich man who cannot share generously with the poor can miss it.  The fig tree that bears no figs can wither outside the Kingdom.  And you don’t want to run out of oil for your lamp while you wait for its coming.

The Kingdom is given to children and to those who will accept it with childlike glee.  It gives a full day’s wage to all the laborers, even those who show up at the last hour. 

The Kingdom’s champion is a Samaritan heretic who acted with compassion for a stranger.  The Kingdom’s only law is love – love God, and love your neighbor as yourself.

Jesus says that it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom, and that if you seek first the Kingdom of God, everything else will fall into place. 

Finally, Jesus says that in him, the Kingdom has begun.  He says that it is near, that it is among you, that it is within you.  (Luke 17:20)  It is here and now. 

Let me share with you an old Jewish folktale:

There once was a poor man who grew weary of the corruption and hatred that he saw every day.  He was tired of the constant injustice that his people experienced, and the loneliness of his isolated living.  His family and friends listened as he spoke passionately of his desire for a city where justice was honored and where personal wholeness could be found.  Night after night he dreamed of a city where heaven touched earth.

One day he announced that he could wait no longer.  He packed a meager meal, kissed his wife and children, and set out in search of the magical city of his dreams.  He walked all day and just before the sunset, he found a place to sleep just off the road, in a forest.  He ate his sandwich, said his prayers and smoothed the earth where he would lie.  Just before he went to sleep, he placed his shoes in the center of the path, pointing in the direction he would continue the next day.

That night a sly fellow was walking the same path and discovered the traveler’s shoes.  Unable to resist a practical joke, he turned the shoes around, pointing them in the direction from which the man had come.

Early the next morning the traveler arose, said his prayers, ate what remained of the food he had brought, and started his journey by walking in the direction his shoes pointed.  He walked all day long, and just before sunset he saw the heavenly city off in the distance.  It wasn’t as large as he had expected, and it looked strangely familiar.  He entered a street that looked much like his own, knocked on a familiar door, greeted the family – who turned out to be his family – and lived happily ever after in the heavenly city of his dreams. [i]

The Kingdom of God is among us.  Like a hidden seed seeking to grow into flourishing.  It is as simple as doing God’s will here and now, which is always to do love and compassion.  Childlike in its simplicity.  But not easy.  It takes perseverance, perseverance, perseverance.  But ask, seek, and knock.  Keep trusting.  Keep trying.  Trying to love.  Love God; love neighbor; love yourself.  And you may find yourself knocking on an oh-so-familiar door and greeting the Kingdom of God here and now.

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[i] William R. White, Stories for Telling, Augsburg, 1986, p. 92

Birthpangs

Sermon preached by the Rev. Lowell E. Grisham, Rector

St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas

November 18, 2012; 25 Pentecost, Proper 27, Year B

Episcopal Revised Common Lectionary

(Mark 13:1-8)  As Jesus came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, "Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!" Then Jesus asked him, "Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down."

When he was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, "Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about to be accomplished?" Then Jesus began to say to them, "Beware that no one leads you astray. Many will come in my name and say, `I am he!' and they will lead many astray. When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. This is but the beginning of the birthpangs."

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Then Jesus began to say to them, “Beware that no one leads you astray…  When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come.  For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines.  This is but the beginnings of the birthpangs.”  Mark 13:5-8

During a family reunion earlier this year, one of my relatives offered me a bit of wisdom and advice – a word about the future:  “The movie.  2016.  You gotta see it.  It tells the truth.”  I was curious.  I hadn’t heard of it.  I looked it up.  2016, Obama’s America is a beautifully filmed documentary telling how Barak Obama intends to carry out his father’s dream that the sins of colonialism be set right by downsizing America in order to increase the power of the nations that have been oppressed by U.S. and Western domination.  It is actually the fourth highest grossing U.S. documentary in the last forty years.  It purports to be an apocalyptic vision of the future.  It is a vision of great fear.

Following the recent election, citizens from more than twenty states have filed petitions, each with more than 25,000 signatures, requesting that their state secede from the union in order to create their own state government. 

A lot of people have an apocalyptic vision for our immediate future.  Many fear a nuclear Iran and the threat of radicalized Islam; many fear economic chaos and government activism; and some feel they must do something in order to escape.

So often our fears emerge from our focus.  We look at the big picture and at the enormity of problems and circumstances beyond our influence.  We hear of “wars and rumors of wars, nations rising against nations,” fiscal cliffs and income inequalities.  These things are so big, and we feel so small.

As Jesus came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!”  Then Jesus asked them, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.”

Jesus of Nazareth spoke those words as they gazed upon one of the most remarkable buildings in the ancient world, the largest building ever constructed on earth for the purpose of worship.  The largest stone in the Pyramids is 70 tons.  The Jerusalem Temple had 600-ton stones.  How small Jesus must have looked next to that building, especially when he was executed by crucifixion outside its walls.

Some forty years after these words were spoken, the Temple was destroyed.  At the same moment of the Temple’s demise, a small movement following the crucified Nazarene was quietly establishing underground communities of faithful followers throughout the Roman Empire.  Their movement would outlast the Eternal Empire of Rome. 

God is working.  Under the radar, behind the scenes, in humble beginnings.  God is working.  Trust God.  Switch your focus.  The Kingdom of God is not about great stones or empires or wars.  The Kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, or a poor woman offering two coins in that great Temple.  The Kingdom of God is not so much about the ninety-nine sheep, safe and secure, but about the lost one that the Good Shepherd seeks. 

There are so many stories in the Bible about God’s working through the humble and meek.  Last week we heard about two immigrant women – one a foreigner, the Moabite Ruth.  The other, her mother-in-law Naomi, a widow with no male protector.  You don’t get any more marginalized than that.  Yet, thanks to Naomi’s creativity, Ruth became the great-grandmother of King David, himself an unlikely monarch, the seventh and youngest son of Jesse.

This week we have Hannah, a barren woman, unable to have children in a culture where producing children is a woman’s highest purpose.  Her family visits the ancient shrine at Shiloh.  Eli the priest is the person of importance in this powerful place.  Hannah prays earnestly, passionately.  Eli thinks she is drunk.  The hierarchy is wrong.  He cannot see rightly.  He seems not to have the capacity to discern the sacred from the secular.  The vested authority doesn’t understand.  But God hears Hannah’s prayers.  She will be given a son.  He will be Samuel, the first prophet of Israel and a great leader.

This morning we chanted the Song of Hannah.  It sounds more like the psalm a king or general might offer after victory over a mighty foe.  It imagines great reversals of power:

            The bows of the mighty are broken,*

                        but the weak are clothed in strength.

            Those once full now labor for bread,*

                        those who hungered now are well fed.

God raises the poor from the dust;*

            and lifts the needy from the ash heap

To make them sit with the rulers*

            and inherit a place of honor.

That sounds a lot like another hymn of great reversals:

            He hath put down the mighty from their seat,

                        and hath exalted the humble and meek.

            He hath filled the hungry with good things,

                        and the rich he hath sent empty away.  Lk. 1:53-53

Maybe you recognize those words from the Magnificat, the Song of Mary, another humble woman with childbirth issues.  A young peasant, she was presented with an unexpected, inconvenient pregnancy.  According to Matthew (1:18-25), it took an angelic visitation in a dream to convince her fiancé Joseph not to leave her.  Her baby, born in a stable and executed outside the walls of the great Temple, we call Savior of the World, Lord of Lord and King of Kings. 

He told us, “When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed…  (T)here will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines.  This is but the beginning of the birthpangs.”

Under the radar, there are always new things coming to birth.

The recent 50-year flashbacks to 1962 produced some retrospective on our closest brush with nuclear war, the Cuban Missile Crisis.  That same year China was reeling from a famine that scholars believe killed 45 million people.  45 million.  Let that number sink in for a moment.  And in Rogers, Arkansas in 1962, Sam Walton opened the first Wal-Mart.  I don’t believe it was reported in the New York Times.

In 1975, Saigon fell, ending the Vietnam War and the United States’ 15-year military commitment there.  That same year, the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia began a purge that would cost two million lives, and the U.S. federal government signed multi-billion dollar loans to save New York City from bankruptcy.  Also in 1975, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, twenty-year old Bill Gates and his friend Paul Allen started Micro-Soft.

Around the turn of the year between 1982 and 1983, the Mexican debt crisis was spreading throughout Latin America.  The entire city of Times Beach, Missouri was bought out and evacuated because of dioxin levels in the soil.  Over 2,000 Bangladeshi Muslims were massacred in Assam, India; and sixty-three people were killed in a bombing at the U.S. embassy in Beirut.  But also on New Year’s Day, 1983, the TCP/IP protocol suite was standardized, keying the development of what would become the Internet.

Do not be alarmed.  Do not be afraid.  “This is but the beginnings of the birthpangs.” 

God is always bringing to birth something new.  Today -- 2012 in the shadow of the coming of 2013 -- God is doing a new thing.  A new thing.  But it is happening so far off the radar, we can’t see it.  Not yet.  But it’s there.  It’s happening.

So, fear not.  Do not be afraid.  Do not be anxious.  Instead – trust!  Trust God.  Be of good faith.  And quietly, humbly, in your own small circle of relationships, do what Jesus has taught us to do.  Love God; love your neighbor as yourself.  And who knows?  Your humble faithfulness might plant seeds that God uses to heal the world far beyond our means or our imagination.  You may be this generation’s Ruth, or Hannah, or Mary.